Free libraries for creating and editing PDF files
A week ago, a free library was released to generate pdf-files of the version of OpenPDF 1.1.0 , the most significant upgrade of this library lately.
OpenPDF is a Java library for creating and editing PDF files, which is distributed under the dual LGPL / MPL license. The library is based on fork iText. In reality, she has such a story: All the forks are telling a story from a single version of iText 4.2.0, which was released eight years ago and became the latest version under a free license. The iText developers themselves switched to AGPL and concentrated on creating the fifth version in order to more successfully sell commercial software. By now they have grown to version iText 7.
. But the free project did not die either, but continued development by the forces of the whole community.
Since that time, the library has been improved in some ways, several bugs have been fixed. Although the changes are not very significant, but development continues, and everyone can contribute. If you need any specific functionality when generating PDF files, then suggest a patch and implement this function for everyone.
Since the old “original” version 4.2.0, the following changes have been made.
OpenPDF is a convenient way to embed PDF generation into your project, including a cryptographic digital signature. This is a ready and free module suitable for use in electronic document management. And such a system can be used, for example, with certificates for signing a PDF , to certify and approve PDF documents. Or integrate with GlobalSign's Digital Signing Service cloud signatures . Although the latter is already working, for example, with the solution for signing Adobe Sign documents in the Adobe Document Cloud. Bouncy Castle
Crypto Library Supportquite helpful. The architecture of Bouncy Castle is based on a set of low-level APIs that implement all cryptographic algorithms. There is support for standard high-level cryptographic APIs of the Java and C # platforms.
Bouncy Castle's Java APIs in version 1.53 included about 400 thousand lines of code and supported a large number of algorithms, including basic X.509 certificate generation, JCE / JCA, PKCS # 10, PKCS # 12, S / MIME, OpenPGP, DTLS, TLS, OCSP, TSP, CMP, CRMF, DVCS, DANE, EST, Attribute Certificate (AC) certificates, which are used to associate additional information with a public key certificate.
It should be noted that in addition to OpenPDF, there are other free libraries for generating PDF. For example, there is still veraPDFor the wonderful Apache PDFBox library . The latter is actively supported and has a rich set of functions:
So nowadays it’s not at all necessary to use proprietary tools for creating or editing PDF. There are many free alternatives for this.
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OpenPDF is a Java library for creating and editing PDF files, which is distributed under the dual LGPL / MPL license. The library is based on fork iText. In reality, she has such a story: All the forks are telling a story from a single version of iText 4.2.0, which was released eight years ago and became the latest version under a free license. The iText developers themselves switched to AGPL and concentrated on creating the fifth version in order to more successfully sell commercial software. By now they have grown to version iText 7.
LibrePDF/OpenPDF
forked from rtfarte/OpenPDF
forked from kulatamicuda/iText-4.2.0
forked from daviddurand/iText-4.2.0
forked from ymasory/iText-4.2.0. But the free project did not die either, but continued development by the forces of the whole community.
Since that time, the library has been improved in some ways, several bugs have been fixed. Although the changes are not very significant, but development continues, and everyone can contribute. If you need any specific functionality when generating PDF files, then suggest a patch and implement this function for everyone.
Since the old “original” version 4.2.0, the following changes have been made.
- compilation with java 8 support
- if the PDF file ends unexpectedly, an IOException is thrown, not PDFNull
- Patch adopted to fix NPE in XFA Form (escapeSom method)
- accepted functionality of UnembedFontPdfSmartCopy by Vicente Alencar
- accepted RTF Footer functionality from ubermichael
- compatibility fix to support more recent Bouncy Castle cryptographic libraries (1.54)
- some NPE fixes and “twisted” support for the Maven framework
OpenPDF is a convenient way to embed PDF generation into your project, including a cryptographic digital signature. This is a ready and free module suitable for use in electronic document management. And such a system can be used, for example, with certificates for signing a PDF , to certify and approve PDF documents. Or integrate with GlobalSign's Digital Signing Service cloud signatures . Although the latter is already working, for example, with the solution for signing Adobe Sign documents in the Adobe Document Cloud. Bouncy Castle
Crypto Library Supportquite helpful. The architecture of Bouncy Castle is based on a set of low-level APIs that implement all cryptographic algorithms. There is support for standard high-level cryptographic APIs of the Java and C # platforms.
Bouncy Castle's Java APIs in version 1.53 included about 400 thousand lines of code and supported a large number of algorithms, including basic X.509 certificate generation, JCE / JCA, PKCS # 10, PKCS # 12, S / MIME, OpenPGP, DTLS, TLS, OCSP, TSP, CMP, CRMF, DVCS, DANE, EST, Attribute Certificate (AC) certificates, which are used to associate additional information with a public key certificate.
It should be noted that in addition to OpenPDF, there are other free libraries for generating PDF. For example, there is still veraPDFor the wonderful Apache PDFBox library . The latter is actively supported and has a rich set of functions:
- Extract Unicode text from PDF files.
- Merge several files or split one PDF into parts.
- Extract data from PDF forms or fill them out.
- Validation of PDF for compliance with the PDF / A-1b standard.
- Print PDF through standard Java API.
- Saving as images such as PNG or JPEG.
- Create PDF from scratch, with embedded fonts and illustrations.
- Digital Signature PDF.
So nowadays it’s not at all necessary to use proprietary tools for creating or editing PDF. There are many free alternatives for this.
GMO GlobalSign Russia PROMOTION for Habr subscribers
You can receive additional information by contacting GlobalSign manager by phone: +7 (499) 678 2210 or fill out the form on the website, indicating the promotional code CS002HBFR.